


The statistical probability of love at first sight

by mikhailosbitch



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, BadBoy!Ian, College AU, Gallavich Week 2017, M/M, Shy Mickey Milkovich, nerd!mickey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-31
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-12-09 09:03:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,718
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11665938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mikhailosbitch/pseuds/mikhailosbitch
Summary: Staring down at him was no other than Ian Gallagher, star of the college basketball team, ultimate bad boy with a fan club of crazy bitches drooling all over him, that only hadn’t gotten kicked out yet because he was a fucking pro at basketball.Everybody on campus knew Ian and his douchebag friends and everybody knew he had a sports scholarship and everybody knew he could basically do anything he wanted because he was an asshole that could twist everyone around his pinky.





	The statistical probability of love at first sight

**Author's Note:**

> That moment when you realize your story is getting way longer than you originally planned.  
> I ran out of time so the ending is a little rushed. But I’m thinking about extending this work one day because I have a lot more ideas for it.  
> For now, it's for the second day of Gallavich Week B 2017 "Bad Boy Ian & Nerd Mickey" but to be honest I couldn't make Ian too much of a bad boy, sorry, I hope you enjoy reading it anyway.
> 
> I don’t really know anything about Biology and professional journals, Nature Reviews Genetics is just a journal I found on the internet. Neither do I know shit about college and basketball so, sorry for mistakes here. Everything is based on stuff I read in other stories and found on the internet as well as from the wonderful PenelopePenniworth.
> 
> Title stolen from a very good book by Jennifer E. Smith

„Well, our lesson is over. I’ll see you tomorrow, oh and don’t forget to send your assignments in, they’re due tonight at ten.“

There were a lot of eye rolls and groans at the sudden realization of his course mates that there was a twenty pages paper they had to write in the span of a few hours. Mickey just sighed. He had finished that stupid thing two days ago and already sent it in. It’s not like it was hard or anything.

To be honest, he had had trouble to keep it down to twenty pages since there was a shitload of stuff to write on the topic so he had spent way too much time cutting things out.

 

The room was slowly emptying, the people forming into little groups with their friends and leaving into the width of campus. Mickey watched them chatting and laughing at each others’ jokes, throwing their backpacks over their shoulders and bumping fists.

He didn’t know what it was like to be friends with someone. How meeting up for lunch felt or how complaining to your buddies about school stuff would be like. Well, not that he would ever complain about school.

He was taking different courses of the science department and every single class was like heaven to Mickey.

Math, however, was his favorite. It was clear. Numbers didn’t confuse him, not like people did. There was only black or white, right or wrong, nothing in between. No feelings, just rational thinking. Basically the only thing he was good at.

 

“Mr Milkovich?” his teacher said as Mickey was on his way to the door. Shit.

It still felt weird to be called “Mr” because it held respect. Something he wasn’t used to and probably never would be.

“Yeah?” He turned around and walked back to Mr Rayman’s desk. Mickey wouldn’t admit it but he liked the guy. He lived for his job and didn’t put up with the shit some of the other students tried to pull.

Which didn’t mean Mickey wanted to talk to him right now.

As much as Rayman was a good teacher, as much did he also want to help his students and talk to them about personal shit. And he wasn’t blind.

 

It was not a secret that Mickey was either walking alone to class, hiding behind a book in the library or solving math problems in his dorm and unfortunately his biology teacher seemed to believe it was his responsibility to change that. The result had been some awkward as fuck conversations about meeting other people and the fact that college’s purpose wasn’t only graduating but also having fun and “experiencing the wild youth” as Rayman called it.

Well fuck that, if you asked Mickey so he wasn’t exactly looking forward to another private talk with his teacher.

He suppressed a sigh and prepared himself for the upcoming pep talk but Rayman just looked at him with something that Mickey, if he didn’t know better, would think was pride.

“What?” he snapped, shifting uncomfortably from one foot to the other. He hated being stared at and Rayman’s eyes were basically piercing through him, making him squirm in uneasiness.

 

“I read your paper” he simply said, a small smile forming around his lips, “And I’m thinking about sending it to one of my colleagues who works for _Nature Reviews Genetics_. She’s planning on publishing several articles written by students and currently looking for good ones. Yours is, in fact, excellent. I wanted to ask what you think about that.”

 

To be honest, Mickey was kind of dumbfounded. Out of all things Mr Rayman could have wanted to talk about he would have never expected this. Sure, he had put some effort into that paper, tried to add some new thoughts and the latest and most interesting facts but in the end it was just another assignment for school, a party pooper for most people and a welcome distraction for him.

Rayman was still staring at him, his gaze expectant, waiting for his response.

 

“You don’t have to answer right now” his teacher assured when he didn’t get one, “The project won’t start for another month at least, so how about you think about it for a couple days. But if you’re worried about copyrights, the article would be published with you getting full credit of course.”

 

Well, copyright issues hadn’t even crossed Mickey’s mind yet. He was still hung up on the fact that Rayman seemed to think there were actually other people who would like his stuff. And _Nature Reviews Genetics_ was a big journal. The kind of journal leading scientists, professors and weird nerds like himself read. To sum it up, the shit in that journal reached a whole fucking lot of people and it was sort of hard for Mickey to wrap his head around the possibility that those people would read _his_ thoughts.

 

“Uhm” he said eloquently, looking down on the dirty linoleum and his even dirtier worn-out sneakers, not wanting to meet Rayman’s eyes.

 “I uh, will think about it.” It wasn’t much but Mickey’s pretty sure his teacher was used to his non-existing social skills by now because Rayman seemed to be content with that, at least for the moment, and his smile widened.

“Okay, great!” he said, actually sounding cheerful which grossed Mickey out a little, “See you tomorrow then.”

“Yeah” was all Mickey answered, still focusing on his shoes with the mismatched laces and shuffled out of the room as quickly as possible, his things awkwardly shoved under his arm because he didn’t want to be in here any longer than necessary, sorting his stuff and risk Rayman thinking of other things he wanted to talk to Mickey about.

 

Well, that decision fucked him in the ass two seconds later when he rushed into the hallway. It was almost empty by now, most students having fucked off to their dorms since it was the last class today, or gone to one of the countless faggy hipster coffee shops that were spread all over campus.

 

But _almost_ empty meant that there was one guy in the hallway and he happened to be exactly in front of the door, right when Mickey fled from his teacher which ended up in Mickey fully bumping into the guy and dropping all his school supplies on the floor. Fuck.

 

“Oh, shit, sorry!” The guy exclaimed and Mickey was ready to tell him to just fuck off because, one, who the hell would apologize when Mickey was the one who ran into him, and two, Mickey hated every kind of human interaction unless it was with Mandy and even then he hated it most of the time but it wasn’t like she ever gave a shit about that.

 

But then he looked up and saw who had just gotten his heavy as fuck bio book on his foot and the words got stuck in his throat.

 

Staring down at him was no other than Ian Gallagher, star of the college basketball team, ultimate bad boy with a fan club of crazy bitches drooling all over him, that only hadn’t gotten kicked out yet because he was a fucking pro at basketball.

Everybody on campus knew Ian and his douchebag friends and everybody knew he had a sports scholarship and everybody knew he could basically do anything he wanted because he was an asshole that could twist everyone around his pinky.

On the unofficial ranking list of students on campus Ian was right on top and Mickey wasn’t even on that list because he was a nobody. You can’t really put someone on the list that no one even notices.

 

All this popped into his head in the fraction of the second they locked eyes before Mickey did what he always did when it came to speaking to people. He looked down on the floor. Or, in this case, the floor littered with his shit.

There was his green lunch box with the half eaten sandwich he made this morning, a bunch of books and loose papers because Mickey hated using folders, much to his teachers’ displeasure, some pens, and his old headphones that didn’t really work anymore.

 

All in all it was a very welcome distraction of Ian’s eyes that he could feel were still looking at him and his fiery red hair and the fact that he was way taller than Mickey and over all just pretty fucking hot.

That was until Ian decided to crouch down and start picking Mickey’s things up, still muttering “sorry” under his breath and making it very hard for him to pursue his usual ‘conversation tactic’ of staring down to avoid looking at the person talking to him.

 

After about three seconds Mickey’s brain started working again and switched to survival mode which meant  getting the fuck out of the situation so he bent down as well and picked his things off the floor.

When he was done he stood up again and found Ian standing too, holding the other half of his shit in his hands.

Mickey’s own hands were full and there was no way he would be able to carry the things Ian was holding in his arms on top so they were just awkwardly standing there, Mickey concentrating on a spot at the wall somewhere behind Ian’s shoulder.

 

“How about you put all this in your backpack?” Ian asked, motioning his arms towards the stained rucksack hanging off Mickey’s shoulder. The stupid thing had holes and an only sometimes working zipper but even with these obvious flaws it was still a better option than carrying everything in his arms.

He moved his shoulder until the backpack slipped down and was hanging on his arm and before he even knew it Ian had freed some of his fingers from the mess of Mickey’s headphones and opened it.

Instead of just dumping the stuff into the bag Ian placed each item one after the other carefully inside the backpack, the heavy books at the back, the lighter stuff at the front. Then he took the things Mickey was still holding and put them inside as well.

 

“Here you go” he smiled when the zipper was closed again, thank god the damn thing worked right now. Somehow, his, from this social encounter, already exhausted mind remembered that he might should reply something.

Preferably a ‘thank you’.

He mumbled a short “thanks” in Ian’s direction, so quiet that Ian probably didn’t notice it but then he heard “No big deal” so he figured Ian must have understood him anyway.

 

“I’m Ian by the way” Ian added and before Mickey could stop his goddamn tongue he said “I know.”

Oh, fuck.

Ian tilted his head to the side, curiously eyeing him and Mickey resisted the urge to roll his eyes because Ian couldn’t really be surprised that Mickey knew his name. _Everybody_ on campus did.

 

Ian kept staring at him and the skin on Mickey’s neck kept getting hotter as he still looked at the same spot somewhere behind Ian, desperately trying to think of something to say to get out of here.

But Ian beat him to it by asking “So who are you?”

Right, when someone told you their name it was common fashion to tell them yours.

“Mickey” he muttered. Wow, he really was a pro at keeping conversations up.

“Well, Mickey I guess I’ll see you around some time.”

Mickey highly doubted that. They had been to college for almost a year now and while Mickey had heard about Ian within the first week, it was more than likely that Ian had just seen him for the first time.

Mickey was invisible to most people and he fucking liked it that way. Well, mostly.

 

“Yeah, see ya” he answered and Ian smiled again before he turned around and took off down the hall, probably on his way to some stupid ass college party.

 

When Ian was gone Mickey felt the strong urge to bang his head at the door but that would probably raise questions from Mr Rayman who was still on the other side of it and the last thing Mickey needed right now was another heart-to-heart with his professor. Instead he opted for biting the inside of his cheek so hard that he tasted blood.

 

There was absolutely no reason to freak out about this encounter. Sure, he had amazingly embarrassed himself but it wasn’t like Mickey didn’t do that every day. With all kinds of people.

He was used to it by now and didn’t really give a fuck what others thought of him. The shit he did for school, that was important. It was easy, for him, so much easier than chatting with his roommate, who gave up pretty quickly trying to do small talk with him, or even calling take-out service and ordering a pizza. Mickey avoided people like the plague and liked it best to be alone, a situation he found himself way too rarely in.

 

But the problem was, he _was_ freaking out about this encounter. And that may have to do something with the massive crush he had on Ian.

 

It was no secret that Ian was gay (which, honestly, didn’t mean Mickey wouldn’t have a crush on him if he wasn’t and which also didn’t mean Mickey had any chances with him). Of course the gay thing didn’t stop the girls pining for him. There were just _a lot_ of people pining for Ian and, as much as he hated to admit it, Mickey was one of them.

 

He had liked Ian since the second he saw him, the guy was the embodiment of beautiful, and the bad boy image Ian had established for himself during the first couple weeks of college hadn’t exactly helped that issue.

 

There were rumors about selling weed, shooting guns on the sports field at night, and fucking a new guy every week, allegedly doing it everywhere on school grounds. While Mickey approved of the first two things, he did not need to know how many dudes had taken it up the ass from Ian.

The weed thing however, was pretty cool, he was a nerd and loved school but even he praised Mandy every time she visited him and brought a couple joints with her. And even though guns reminded him of very very dark days at a certain house on the South Side of Chicago, they still held some weird sense of familiarity and home to them.

 

His dad hadn’t been proud of Mickey when he had solved math problems for ten year olds at the age of four and he hadn’t been proud when Mickey read his first words when he was three. Terry was proud when Mickey hit the target for the first time on his ninth birthday, the bullet going right through the old glass of the beer bottle standing under the L.

 

Mickey had learned pretty quickly that Terry hated cleverness and everything that came along with it so he shot his guns and went on runs with his father and his brothers and hid his books that his mom sometimes brought home for him, under his bed, only digging them up at night under the covers, reading about all the stuff out there in this world, somewhere far away from the piece of shit neighborhood that was his home.

He had gotten really fucking good at pretending over the years and that turned out to come in very handy when he realized there was another secret to keep from his dad if he wanted to stay alive.

 

Despite the beatings, and the insults and the cold in Terry’s eyes whenever he looked at his youngest son, Mickey loved his dad. In some fucked up way. And wanted him to be proud.

Well, there was one thing Terry hated even more than smart asses. Fags.

Of fucking course it was Mickey’s luck to be one. Not that Terry would ever know about that if Mickey could help it.

 

So yeah, Mickey had it bad for Ian.

And maybe, talking to him had felt a little bit less uncomfortable than speaking with other people.

And maybe, just maybe, Mickey kinda smiled at the thought that Ian now knew his name, as he made his way to his dorm.

 

*

 

 _Ouch!_ was the first thing Ian wanted to scream as something hit his foot. It turned out to be a thick science book and it weighed a ton, trapping his toes under a shitload of pages.

But instead of crying out he stuttered a quick “Oh, shit, sorry!” because to be honest he had been running down the hall, not giving two shits about who might emerge from the rooms, trying to get away from his latest fuck that didn’t seem to get the meaning of ‘get laid and go’.

 

They had hooked up behind the gym but afterwards the other guy had been all clingy and obviously hoping for another round but fuck that, the only chance Ian would bang the same thing twice was when the lay was one of the best he’s ever had and Joe, or Jared, or whatever the fuck his name was, hadn’t even been close to that.

 

The need to put as much distance between him and the gym as possible, got pushed back when Ian’s head snapped up to see the person he had run into and who had dropped their book on his foot.

They both looked up at the exact same second and for a brief moment Ian stared directly into ice blue eyes, that quickly casted downward again, much to Ian’s disappointment.

 

He was not one to lack of words usually, hell he was a master at small talk, if he wanted to be, but right then and there he was at loss of what to say because, honestly, he was a little busy taking in the sight of the guy in front of him. He couldn’t see all of his face since the guy was obviously intently focused on his school supplies on the floor, but Ian noticed his pale skin, the straight nose and the matt black hair. He was a good bit shorter than Ian who couldn’t help finding that pretty fucking endearing.

 

Ian wasn’t sure how much time passed until he remembered that awkwardly staring at people, no matter how obviously cute they were, was considered weird and inappropriate so he forced his gaze to the mess around their feet and bent down to clean it up, apologizing a few more times. Though he wasn’t sure if it was about bumping into each other or for blatantly checking him out for too long.

 

The floor was clear of daily college supplies pretty quickly but now both their arms were packed with them and Ian was contemplating whether he would come off as too weird to bring the guy to his dorm so he could dump his stuff there and maybe get his number, when he saw the backpack hanging off the guy’s arm and he settled for the worse yet probably more sensible option of putting the things in there.

 

“Here you go” he said when everything was save inside the backpack, that looked like it would fall apart any minute, and usually he would have just added a casual “You free?” that normally was followed by a “Wanna get out of here?” if the answer was “Yes” which was pretty much always the case. But for some strange reason Ian found himself in a position he hadn’t been in in front of a guy since he was twelve.

 

He was _nervous_.

 

And, which was even stranger, unlike all the other occasions he laid eyes on something that he liked, he didn’t immediately want to jump it. Well, he wouldn’t mind to but surprisingly the urge to learn the guy’s name rather than fucking him was stronger at the moment, and Ian _never_ bothered to learn the names of the people he banged.

 

“Thanks” the guy said, as Ian handed him his backpack, it was quiet but it was there and gave Ian the opportunity to reply something.

“No big deal” he answered and quickly continued: “I’m Ian, by the way.”

“I know” the guy shot back, he was still avoiding Ian’s eyes and focusing on the wall but Ian didn’t miss the way his eyes widened a little bit like he himself was surprised he had said those words.

_Well,_ _are you going to tell me_ your _name?_

Ian didn’t want to come off as some stalker-like weirdo, he knew his name was familiar to most people on campus so he wasn’t surprised the guy was aware of who he was but since they only almost knocked each other out with their foreheads and well, with a certain science book, there was a big chance he wasn’t going to learn the stranger’s name.

 

“Mickey.” He said, his voice small, but telling him his name nonetheless and Ian didn’t give a shit that the guy’s, Mickey’s parts of this talk were like two syllables max so far.

“Well, Mickey I guess I’ll see you around some time” Ian replied, liking the way _Mickey_ felt on his tongue.

“Yeah, see ya” Mickey answered after a short moment of hesitation and the way the corners of Ian’s mouth just went out of control and upwards as Mickey shyly looked up for a brief moment and Ian saw that luminous blue again, was absolutely not okay.

 

Before Ian would do something very stupid like kiss the guy, he spun around and walked down the hallway, every original intention of getting rid of the bad gym fuck forgotten, but rather trying to find a speed that wouldn’t come off to Mickey as _I wanna get away from you as quickly as possible_ , because honestly that was the last thing he wanted,  but neither imply _I wanna slam you against that locker and shove my tongue down your throat_.

 

By the time he reached his dorm, he had calmed down a bit and only wanted to drag his fingers down his face and groan at his obvious weirdness during that conversation with Mickey. He considered this as a small success.

 

He opened the door of his dorm, ready to collapse onto his bed and maybe have a wet dream about a certain guy with black hair, only to be blessed with the very annoying sight of his asshole brother occupying the mattress.

 

“The fuck are you doing here?” he snapped, made his way through his messy half of the room and slumped down on the chair in front of his desk.

Lip was typing something on his computer, all the scholarship people got a lap top for free, otherwise they both would spend all day in the library researching shit, eyes not leaving the screen as he muttered “Well, hello to you too, little bro.”

 

“Why the hell are you lying in my bed?” Ian prompted, eyes narrowing on Lip. Shithead hadn’t even bothered to take his shoes off.

“My roommate is busy eating his girlfriend out in our room, figured I could crash here for a little while. Your roommate let me in.”

“Over night!?” Ian asked, making a mental note to tell Scott their dorm was forbidden territory for Lip unless Ian explicitly allowed his presence there.

 

Ian did miss  his home and his family but sharing a room with his siblings was definitely not a part of that. It came in handy that Lip and him were at the same college because as much as they claimed to hate each other sometimes, his big brother was Ian’s best friend and always got his back.

But occasionally he was also a pain in the ass, and now it was one of those occasions.

Ian sighed. He was not going to make Lip sleep in a room with two people fucking, he wouldn’t do that to Lip’s roommate but it didn’t mean he liked the idea of him staying over.

 

“Don’t you got some chick’s apartment off campus to crash at?”

“Nope” Lip replied, still typing and apparently completely unbothered by Ian’s annoyance.

“What about the girl that blew you in the lab yesterday?” Unfortunately Lip hadn’t spared any details about that event but Ian had to admit Lip always listened to his own escapades about his sex life as well so they were squared.

“Why not?” Jeeze, Lip could go fuck himself if he couldn’t even take his gaze off the screen to talk to him.

“She’s got a party tonight and I gotta finish this bio paper” Lip said, “It’s due tonight at ten. If you haven’t realized what a great enlightenment I am for your mind by then, I can leave and go to her place.”

 

Well, he should have known. Lip was one of those people who always did shit last minute but still managed to nail it. He would write that paper, send it to the teacher at exactly 9:59 and then take off to get drunk and laid at a party.

To be honest though, except for the doing shit at last minute part, Ian was pretty much the same. They were known, the Gallagher brothers, for their excessive partying and fucking, the only differences being the gender they preferred to bang and the fact that Lip was basically a genius while Ian’s grades were average at best.

 

But tonight there was no party planned that Ian and his friends were interested in going to and for once he had already done all his homework so he had been looking forward to laying in his bed, watching movies and maybe rubbing one out since his roommate was not here at the moment.

Lip kinda crushed this plan.

“First of all, get off my bed. Take the camping mat from underneath” Ian ordered and punched his brother in the elbow. “Now!”

 

Lip let out an exaggerated sigh, like Ian was the most unnerving person he ever met, but slipped on the floor and dug around in the dusty space under Ian’s bed, searching for the sleeping mat Ian kept there for occasions like this one.

He rolled it out on the floor, taking up most of Ian’s half of the dorm but at least Ian had his bed back now so he changed into an old shirt and sweats and crawled under the sheets.

 

“Wow man, it’s six o’clock and you throw on your PJs? Getting old, or what” Lip said from his new spot, already punching his thoughts into his laptop again.

Ian didn’t dignify that with a verbal response and just flipped him off. He took his own laptop, switched it on and got comfortable in his bed, the computer on his lap.

He typed in the password of Scott’s, Netflix account. The guy was pretty cool, they often shared their beer or joints and didn’t get into each other’s shit which was pretty much an ideal situation.

 

Ian was midway through Dexter, a recommendation from Fiona, so he clicked the icon with the familiar sight of Dexter Morgan wrapped up in his famous sheets of plastic and waited for the episode to load.

Once the thing started though, he couldn’t really find the attention he needed to understand what was going on.

Instead, his mind started wandering to the encounter earlier in the hallway, replaying it in his head, again and again.

 

Mickey. That was his name. And basically all he knew about the guy so far. But he wanted more.

So while Dexter was busy stabbing serial killers to death Ian tried to collect all the information he could about Mickey.

 

Okay, so first of all, his name was probably short for something. Maybe Michael?

He would have to find out.

Well, what else? Searching his memory for every detail of the event, Ian thought of Mickey’s appearance, clothes-wise. He had been wearing loose pants and a simple shirt, both old and washed-out, same as his shoes. It wasn’t the kind of ‘I’m a vintage digger so I bought those cool knew stone-washed jeans from Levi’s’. No, it was more a style that screamed South Side and Ian felt a weird twitch of relief and sadness in his gut at that thought.

 

A weak throbbing in his toe suddenly reminded him of something else. The science book.

 

“Ay, Lip?”

“Hm?”

“You know someone called Mickey?”

“Uhm.” Lip had stopped typing and when Ian glanced over at him he had a finger on his chin as if he was deep in thought. “Uh, yeah” he said, “the mouse.”

 

Ian felt the strong urge to throw the dirty old socks, he had just discovered under his sheets, at his brother.

“Seriously?”  
“You’re no fun” Lip muttered and returned to his paper, “Who the fuck would be called Mickey anyway. That’s a weird ass-name, man. Why you wanna know?”

 

“Just heard it in the hall and wondered” Ian half-lied, “Haven’t heard it before.”

“Me neither.”

Damnit. He had thought that maybe, Lip would know Mickey somehow since they both seemed to be in the science department but no such luck. He should have known, Lip was even worse at names than Ian.

 

A couple minutes later he contemplated checking a few social media sites and see if he could get some information there. Fuck that would be such a teenage girl move, stalking your crush on Instagram and shit, but honestly that’s what it was. He had talked to him for less than two minutes and he already had a crush on Mickey.

So Netflix was already closed and Ian was in the middle of typing ‘Saint Xavier University Mickey’ when the constant keyboard rattle from Lip’s fingers suddenly stopped.

 

“Wait” his brother said, frowning, “There is this guy in my bio class. No talking, just sitting there and doing his school stuff. Couple weeks ago some others were joking about him I think, might have heard the name Mickey. Not sure though.”

“Well, what does he look like?!” Online research forgotten Ian sat up and stared at his brother, waiting for him to go on. Lip creased his eyebrows.

“Why’re you so interested?”

Ignoring the question Ian said “Does he have black hair, and like, blue eyes and is not that tall?”

Lip nodded. “Yeah, think we’re talking about the same guy.”

 

And then a vicious grin appeared on his face.

“What?” Ian snarled, even though he knew exactly what was coming. Asshole knew him too well.

“You like him” Lip stated, grinning so hard that Ian felt like his face was about to split in half.

There was the very welcoming option of denying it but to be honest where was the point. Lip was on the right track and the fucker knew it. Might just suck it up and endure the teasing until his brother got tired.

 

“So what if I do” he snapped, settling back into the sheets, preparing himself for Lip’s banter.

“Dude, one, the guy is the perfect definition of a nerd, only thing that’s missing are the glasses. Two, you don’t even know if he’s gay and three, you got a reputation to lose. Your league doesn’t hook up with geeks.”

 

Unfortunately Lip was kinda right. Well, Ian didn’t give a fuck about whether Mickey was a nerd or not, he wanted to get to know him. But his friends would indeed care. Ian’s league was the sports people, mainly his buddies from the basketball team. While they didn’t really mind the fact that he was down for the D, the social status of plus ones was very important.

And apart from that there was the huge, very annoying, possibility that Mickey was totally utterly straight.

 

So, yeah, he should just leave it. One run-in a hallway, that was it. No need to be shaken up about it, he didn’t really know anything about Mickey and if he really was the nerd Lip said he was they probably wouldn’t get along at all. Guy didn’t even look him in the eyes during their short conversation and no, Ian did not find that shyness cute. He did not.

He would just drop the whole thing.

 

Ian lasted fifteen minutes until he pulled up Google.

 

Lip was still busy with his project so Ian had all the time he needed to act like his little sister when it came to boys. He checked Facebook, twitter, student forums. Nothing, not even Instagram.

He let out an annoyed huff when suddenly the light bulb went off.

 

During his analysis earlier he had thought that Mickey’s clothes looked familiar. Like South Side. As in piss poor just like Lip and himself.

Ian typed in ‘Saint Xavier University scholarships’. Too bad he didn’t have a surname but maybe he would get something anyway.

Scrolling through the results his eyes scanned the screen for any good information until he found a link that listed all the recipients of scholarships during the last couple years.

He read through all of them, looking for the name Michael or something even remotely similar and eventually he got hung up on _Mikhailo Milkovich, Thomas and Catherine Nessinger scholarship_.

There wasn’t a picture to go along with it but apparently this Mikhailo had got the scholarship this year so he was definitely still a student here.

 

Of course Ian knew that the chance he had found the right guy was fairly slim though point was there was a chance. But he had to admit that information wasn’t really useful. The only thing he knew for sure and that could help him was the fact that Mickey and Lip were in the same bio class.

Which meant Ian would have to live with Lip silently laughing his ass off when he would notice his little brother waiting in front of the classroom, hoping to get to talk to Mickey again.

 

Awesome.

 

\---

 

The next day Ian spent a little more time in the bathroom than necessary, at least in Lip’s much valued opinion, dude had ended up crashing on his floor instead of going to his latest chick’s party, and was one minute late for English but he brushed it off with an apologetic smile at Mrs Longville who shot him an annoyed glance but left it at that.

Ian slipped into his seat at the back of the room, took out his laptop and started taking notes but not before bumping fists with Sean and Ryan, two of his team mates and friends.

Sean was South Side through and through and Ian and him had bonded pretty quickly but Ryan came from the North of Chicago, and had had to earn the respect of his team members with much more effort than the others.

But as it had turned out he could just be as much of a badass since he despised the lifestyle he grew up in. Ryan preferred guns and coke over his daddy’s Porsche which didn’t stop him from accepting his parents’ money and sharing it with his friends so Ian liked him fine.

 

He was on the verge of falling asleep to the steady flow of boredom coming out of Mrs Longville’s mouth when the class was finally over and Ryan slapped a hand on his shoulder.

“Come on, man, get up, time to let school be school and get our heads free.” Ian was more than eager to go along with that idea so he quickly got his stuff and trailed behind his friends into the hallway.

 

While most of the other students were headed to the next class Ryan, Sean and Ian made their way to the sports grounds. The field was empty at this time of the day and the best place to hide out at and get high instead of being a responsible student and attend your class.

 

After their little time-out session the rest of the day was much less boring and it wasn’t until towards the end of his last class that Ian’s high had fully worn off. Kinda perfect timing actually since he wanted to be sober for his next conversation with Mickey.

 

Ian had decided it would be a little too creepy of him to wait in front of Lip’s and Mickey’s class unless he wanted to give his brother material for hours of teasing and weird Mickey out. So he had ditched his friends and told them he was meeting a fuck buddy, but instead he went to the library.

 

One of the perks of being part of the naughty boys at college was the very small chance of meeting one of your bad friends there, plus, the more important, thing was that he hoped to find Mickey somewhere between the bookshelves.

While picking Mickey’s things up the other day he had noticed quite a few books, both fiction and non-fiction amongst them so he figured Mickey spent a lot of time at the library.

 

The room was pretty big and divided into two different parts. The one he was standing in right now, contained a counter with the spectacled librarian behind it and a bunch of work stations with computers, some of which were occupied with industrious students.

Scanning over the room for Mickey’s black hair he let his gaze travel around but couldn’t find anyone who looked like him.

 

He knew it was highly unlikely Mickey was here right now but it was worth a shot and he didn’t really have anything else to work with at the moment so he walked towards the other half of the library that was filled with bookshelves before the woman behind the counter, suspiciously eyeing him, would start asking questions.

 

Despite the size of it the whole room was almost spookily quiet, the only noises being the faint sound of fingers typing and the occasional rustling of paper when someone turned to the next page of whatever they were reading.

 

Ian started wandering around, looking into every aisle and checked every label on each shelf announcing what kind of content it held. He passed the finances area pretty quickly as well as the books about History until he got to the Natural Science section. Pretending to be looking for a certain book he walked between the shelves with stuff about Chemistry, Physics and Biology but no such luck, there was no trace of Mickey.

But Ian was nothing if not persistent so he continued his search through the whole library and fate seemed to be on his side because about five minutes later he found exactly what he was looking for.

 

Mickey was sitting on the floor, cramped into the darkest corner of the library, a heavy book on his lap and obviously completely engulfed in his own world.

He looked illegally cute, dark hair a little messy and thumb on his lip, reading the incredibly small letters on the page that was currently open. And he was wearing glasses. Holy fuck.

Lip would probably shit himself laughing if he were here right now and saw him.

 

“Uhm” Ian cleared his throat and his heart made a little jump in his chest when Mickey’s head snapped up and their eyes met. Now, seeing all of his face Ian thought he looked even better than he remembered. “Hey Mickey.”

 

Mickey was staring at him, his eyes filled with distrust and something Ian would describe as worry. “Hey Ian” he said quietly, voice full of timidness.

 

*

 

Mickey was in the middle of a very interesting chapter about prime numbers when he heard someone approaching him, steps muffled by the dark carpet but still audible and disturbing.

Looking up he found himself in a kind of familiar position because once again Ian was hovering above him and just like last time Mickey was equally surprised. But when green eyes met his own Mickey couldn’t help but feeling backed in a corner.

 

Here Ian was, found him in one of his safe places, looking amazing as ever with his stupid combed back hair and the light smile but why the hell would he come here of all places, to the fucking library.

People like Ian didn’t go to libraries, not even if they needed a book for class, the athletics kids would search online, copy an article from Wikipedia. So the only reason Mickey could think of why Ian would track him down, there was no way he was looking for a stupid math book, was because he was looking for trouble.

 

Trying to check if Ian had brought any of his shithead friends Mickey shifted a little and peeked behind him but there was no one else in sight, seemed like Ian was alone, though that didn’t quite help him relax. He had way too much experience with bullying to know that assholes hid everywhere.

 

Ian greeted him and Mickey warily greeted him back and then Ian was just standing there, hands shoved in his pockets, shuffling around like he was actually some sort of uncomfortable. Mickey wouldn’t dare to use the word nervous.

“Uhm, I was wondering if you could help me with some math stuff” Ian finally mumbled, the corners of his mouth shifting like he wasn’t expecting to say that. When Mickey kept looking at him, now rather confused than anxious, he added “Thought you’re pretty good at it.”

 

To be honest, Mickey was a little too surprised about that to ask why the fuck Ian assumed that, well, thinking about it you didn’t have to be a smart ass to put two and two together when seeing Mickey and his giant supply of nerdy books but whatever, and just raised an eyebrow.

To his own surprise he answered “Okay, what do you wanna know?”

Now Ian’s smile widened and Mickey would be lying if he said he didn’t feel a little excited at the fact that he caused it.

“I don’t even really know honestly, we got these functions where we gotta solve a bunch of problems and I got no clue, man. I have them in my textbook” Ian said and scratched his head. He looked actually sort of embarrassed which calmed Mickey down a bit. It seemed like Ian was indeed here for some help and not for mocking him.

 

*

 

They made their way to Mickey’s dorm and thank fuck his roommate was gone right now. Mickey grabbed the chair from the other desk and pulled it in front of his own.

“Thanks” Ian said and slumped down on the fragile looking thing but it held his heavy ass anyway.

“You wanna beer?” Mickey asked. He was crouching down in front of the little mini-fridge and suddenly Ian noticed how thirsty he was. “Sure.”

Mickey pulled out two beers and cracked them open and Ian tried not to smile too hard at the fact that apparently Mickey drank alcohol while studying. Apparently Mickey was kind of a _cool_ nerd.

 

He sat down next to Ian and grabbed the textbook. “Which pages?”

“Uhm” Ian ran a hand through his hair, “Kinda from the start?”

Mickey only nodded and opened the book at the beginning. He looked over the first couple pages before he said “Fuck this shit” and took a pen and paper, “They can’t explain shit in that book.”

The next thirty minutes Ian spent slowly discovering the wonders of mathematics. Mickey was a fucking genius, in Ian’s totally biased opinion, and explained the stuff in a way that even Ian could follow. The best thing though was watching Mickey getting all excited about numbers. He didn’t exactly freak out but Ian didn’t miss the glint in his eyes as he talked about x and roots and functions. To be honest it was a miracle he even got any of what Mickey was saying because he was also a little busy subtly staring at Mickey. The asshole was just too good looking and the smile Mickey sent him when Ian managed to solve his first problem right was enough to turn to goo.

 

“Wow, that’s the first time I fully understood something in Math” he said as he had finished the last of the problems. “Shut up” Mickey replied but he was smiling as he looked through Ian’s answers, putting a check mark behind every solution.

His eyes were focused on the page, fingers curled around a red pen and he looked so at ease that Ian could barely imagine he was the same Mickey he had met in the library just a couple hours ago.

“Well” he said when he was done, “Looks like you can go back to your buddies now and mess shit up.”

Ian shook his head. “Nah, don’t really feel like it.”

Mickey, who was packing up his pens and notebook, frowned. “Okay, then I guess do whatever the fuck you wanna do.”

 

_Fuck it._

 

“I’d like to kiss you.”

 

Mickey froze, desk half clear, eyes snapping up. They were big and wide and full of surprise and before Ian could think too much about it he leaned forward and pressed their lips together.

He remained that way for a couple seconds, just resting his lips against Mickey’s, letting the shiver it caused run through his whole body and already feeling himself get addicted to Mickey’s taste.

 

When he reluctantly pulled back he searched Mickey’s eyes for his reaction, afraid of what he would see. Ian found Mickey staring at him, obviously shocked but he felt like it was not necessarily in a bad way.

“Why did you do that?” Mickey asked, sounding a little breathless, his eyes darting around like they weren’t sure where to look.

“Mickey, look at me” Ian said, staring at Mickey and forcing him to look at him, “I did that because I like you. I mean I know we just met and that may sound weird but I really like you and I’m sorry if you don-“ Mickey shut him up by kissing him again and Ian’s head became all fuzzy as Mickey parted his lips and let him in.

 

Jesus fuck, that guy could _kiss_.

 

And then his thoughts shut off because he was busy kissing back.

**Author's Note:**

> Well, this was it. For now :)  
> I would kill for some feedback, guys, comments, kudos, compliments or criticism, everything is welcome!


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